It is particularly desirable in the case of utility vehicles, such as tractors, construction machines, stacking trucks and HGVs to have, in addition to a vertical suspension or damping of vertical vibrations respectively, a damping of horizontal vibrations. Vehicles of this type are often driven on uneven ground and frequently have to negotiate steep upward slopes and downward slopes respectively. In this respect, the people in the vehicles are subjected to high impacts and changes in position and direction. To allow an optimum sitting comfort, this should be compensated as effectively as possible both in the vertical direction and in the horizontal direction by a vehicle seat. Unevenness, such as potholes for example, on a flat carriageway also causes this type of impact. When travelling for a relatively long period of time, this can have a tiring effect on the driver of, for example an HGV, or can even cause him/her pain. Vibrations and impacts transversely to the direction of travel can be damped by a transverse or lateral horizontal suspension respectively to protect the back from an unhealthy jarring action, while vibrations which occur when travelling fast or on very hilly ground can be minimised by a longitudinal horizontal suspension.
Horizontal vibration devices are already known from the prior art. However, the used damper systems which are installed between a seat-side upper part and a body-side lower part, usually take up too much space. In particular, the height of a vehicle seat substructure should not be configured to be too great. Furthermore, it is often desirable to configure the damping characteristics of the horizontal vibration device such that they are actively or respectively semi-actively controllable. This usually requires a control/regulating system which requires additional installation space. In most cases, this has a complicated construction and accordingly entails cost-intensive solutions.